Baldwin Park, California police officer charged with assaulting a teenager during a traffic stop
CNN has reached out to Felton’s lawyer, Joshua Visco, for remark however has not but gotten a response.
Attorneys for the teenager, recognized by these legal professionals as Anthony Romero, filed a lawsuit September 10 in opposition to town of Baldwin Park, Felton, a police sergeant and different officers with the division. The go well with seeks a jury trial and normal and punitive damages for Romero.
Based on the lawsuit, on September 22, 2019, Felton assisted one other officer in pulling over a automobile in Baldwin Park after the driving force allegedly didn’t yield throughout a site visitors cease. Romero, then 16 years outdated, was a passenger within the automobile. He exited the automotive and started working out of concern after he noticed officer Felton pointing his firearm by means of the window of the police cruiser, the civil grievance says.
Shortly after being chased on foot by Felton, Romero obeyed the officer’s instructions to cease working and laid down along with his face on the bottom, the grievance says. Romero was not resisting arrest, was not a bodily risk to the officer, was unarmed, and had his arms and palms seen to the officer, the lawsuit says.
Together with his firearm nonetheless drawn, Felton approached the teenager and kicked him, with drive, within the ribs and within the face, “terrifying the plaintiff who thought he was going to die,” in keeping with the grievance.
Felton positioned Romero, who was handcuffed, within the backseat of the police cruiser and, with out being provoked, allegedly struck the teenager within the face and physique, the go well with says. One other officer allegedly watched the incident and didn’t intervene, the go well with says.
The teenager had a bruised face, cuts on his physique, and was coated within the officers’ “shoeprints” from once they had been allegedly “stomping on his legs and physique” within the police station, the grievance says.
When Romero’s mom arrived to select up her son, Felton handed her the quotation and allegedly stated her son “was very fortunate since he may have been shot” and defined he needed to “tough up [the teen] to be able to educate him a lesson.”
Following a legal investigation carried out by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Division, Felton was launched from obligation and is not employed by the Metropolis of Baldwin Park, Captain Chris Hofford advised CNN.
“It was objectively unreasonable for officers to have utilized this degree of drive on my sixteen-year-old consumer,” stated Romero’s lawyer, Wesley Ouchi. “He was cooperative, surrendered, unarmed, non-resisting, compliant, and non-threatening. This conduct is universally unacceptable in any society.”
Felton is scheduled to return to court docket for a listening to on December 7 on the Foltz Legal Justice Middle, the LA County district lawyer’s workplace stated.
